


What You Need

by cosmic_llin



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Domestic, F/F, F/M, Fluff, OT3, Other, Pregnancy, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-20
Updated: 2017-07-20
Packaged: 2018-12-04 19:09:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11561502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmic_llin/pseuds/cosmic_llin
Summary: Nerys gets used to living with the O'Briens.





	What You Need

**Author's Note:**

  * For [vyrenrolar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/vyrenrolar/gifts).



In almost all respects, moving in with the O’Briens was a terrific idea. She gets a little support when she’s tired out and aching, they get to be near their baby as he develops, everyone gets to enjoy Molly’s interminable improvised one-girl shows, and after a lot of dancing around it and one very memorable late night, all three of them seem finally to be on the same page about this thing that’s happening between them.

Nerys still sleeps in her own bed some nights, but other nights she joins them, for sex or just for companionship. In the resistance she’d been used to sleeping surrounded by her comrades, and she’s starting to realise now how much she’s missed it. Everything about leaving the resistance, joining the militia and moving to DS9 was strange, so perhaps the strangeness of suddenly having a bed and quarters all to herself got drowned out by the larger, more urgent concerns. All she knows is she barely thought about it when she lost it, but now she’s found it again she’s glad to have it back.

But then there’s the bathroom, and this is where Nerys  _ knows _ she’s gotten spoiled and pampered. Because back in the resistance she mostly didn’t have a bathroom at all, a lot of the time there was just a pit latrine or some other makeshift arrangement, and she was generally sharing it with at least a dozen other exhausted, smelly people.

So one entire bathroom between three adults and a child is luxurious, really.

But Miles takes  _ so long _ in there in the mornings.

Keiko doesn’t seem to mind. She doesn’t have a shift pattern, so she usually just waits until they’ve both left for work to get ready herself, or sometimes she rises much earlier and she’s dressed and working already by the time Nerys and Miles stumble out of bed.

Keiko is very good at encouraging them to talk calmly about their differences - although Nerys notices that this equanimity mysteriously vanishes when Keiko herself has a grievance - but everything they’ve tried has worked for a maximum of a few days before collapsing. And today, inevitably, she’s supposed to be in Ops in twenty minutes, and she’s still in her nightclothes, hammering on the bathroom door and yelling:

‘Miles Edward O’Brien, your unborn son is pressing on my bladder!’

And a couple of minutes later Miles emerges, frowns at her, and stalks to the bedroom.

‘Thank you  _ so _ much!’ she yells after him.

She’s three minutes late to the morning briefing, and she spends the whole thing glaring at his smug on-time face.

* * *

By the end of her shift, she’s still cranky, but the message that comes through from Keiko cheers her up a little.

_ Meet me at Quark’s? We’ll let Miles take care of Molly for the evening and spend some time just the two of us? _

That sounds infinitely preferable to an evening with Miles right now, so she heads down to Quark’s, grabs their usual table, and Keiko joins her a few minutes later. They kiss hello, and as Keiko asks about her day, she links their fingers together under the table.

Keiko’s writing a paper for a prestigious journal, and she spends twenty minutes taking Nerys through the progress she’s made today. Nerys’s botanical knowledge is more on the practical than academic side, but she follows well enough.

‘It’s so nice to have someone to talk to who understands this stuff,’ Keiko says. ‘Miles tries his best, but it’s just not his field. Mind you, I’m the same whenever he tries to tell me anything about his work. This station may as well run on candy and wishes for all I know.’

An hour later, they’re taking turns throwing sand peas and catching them in their mouths. Two hours later, they’re deeply engrossed in a discussion about Bajoran composers, and whether an Earth clarinet is similar enough to a Bajoran dirba to play pieces originally written with the dirba in mind. Three hours later they ditch Quark’s and go to watch the wormhole open. Keiko helps Nerys down onto one of the low benches with a good view, and puts an arm around her, and the wormhole opens and the tourists clap and Nerys thinks about the Prophets and how sometimes they give you what you need instead of what you ask for.

‘It’s strange,’ she says, ‘being part of a family again. I didn’t really expect it to happen this way.’

Keiko takes her hand, rubs a thumb over her knuckles. ‘I’m glad it did,’ she says. ‘I know this hasn’t been the easiest of adjustments for you, but I feel like it’s been worth it.’

‘It has,’ Nerys smiles. ‘I love living with you and Miles and Molly. I guess I’d just gotten used to my own space and now… I’m getting used to this.’

‘Come on,’ says Keiko. ‘Let’s go home.’

They walk hand in hand down to the habitat ring. As they approach their quarters, Nerys hears a thumping, then loud swearing in Miles’s voice.

Keiko shakes her head, sighs. ‘He was supposed to be done by now,’ she says.

‘Done with what?’

‘It was going to be a surprise…’ says Keiko.

They walk in, following the sound of swearing to Nerys’s room. There’s a giant hole in the wall. Half of Miles is visible through it.

‘Miles!’ says Keiko. ‘You said you’d be done by now!’

‘Christ, is that the time?’ Miles asks. ‘Sorry, I was going to be but then I realised that if I changed the design a little it would be more space efficient, and I guess I just…’

Nerys stares at them both.

‘The quarters next door are empty,’ Keiko explains, ‘and Captain Sisko gave us permission to remodel and add an extra bathroom.’

Miles gives her an apologetic shrug through the hole in the wall.

‘Oh!’ says Nerys. ‘Oh, for me?’

‘Well, it will be,’ says Miles. ‘Once it’s done. But I’m afraid it might be another few hours…’

Nerys reaches through the hole, takes his hand, drags him back through. ‘I love it so much,’ she says. ‘Thank you. But you can work on it tomorrow. For now, let’s all go to bed?’ She glances at the gaping tear in her bedroom wall. ‘In your room.’

She squeezes his hand, and he pulls her into a sideways hug. ‘Sorry about earlier,’ he says.

‘That’s all right,’ she says.

When they get to the bedroom, Keiko brushes her hair and Miles helps her off with her shoes, and she thinks that she’s pretty lucky, really.


End file.
